Exploring Standards of Rigour for Design Cases

Designers share their specialized knowledge by developing design cases, which we define as representations of design efforts and outcomes disseminated to peers. In the field of instructional design this practice is not well established. In addition, many fields in which design is practiced are examining how knowledge is built by designers, and considering the methods of research most applicable to building design knowledge. We consider design cases to be the method of dissemination for that design research which is wholly of apiece with the act of design (as compared to design research carried out in the process of designing or research on design). In considering the factors required to establish this practice, we understand the issue of rigour to be critical, since without standards by which to judge the rigour of a representation this form of knowledge building may always be undervalued in comparison to others. We look to naturalistic inquiry and action research to begin exploring how rigour might be approached in developing design cases, presenting from the perspective of instructional designers and hoping to engage designers from other fields insofar as these ideas are useful to them.